These are the active ingredients that propel this futuristic novel through drought and dust storms called blasters. But these aren’t the only dangers that brothers George and Beeper face after their father doesn’t return from a shopping trip to town. There are also the wanderers, people who move about stealing and murdering to survive under any circumstances.
Then there are people like the teenager Emily, abandoned by her mother when things got too hard. She too needs to survive. But who can she trust? Who will trust her? The issue of family is strong theme in this novel. But what constitutes family? ‘Sometimes you have to make family out of whoever is about’.
Desperate times need desperate measures and when Emily is nearly killed trying to defend the brothers from murderous wanderers, George’s survival instinct kicks in, and he uses his father’s ‘last resort’, drawing on a courage he didn’t know existed. Will they all survive this last blaster, and does George have the courage to create a new family?
This is a chilling story of the outcome environmental destruction and the state of existence when the planet overheats and drought consumes everything. How far will people go to stay alive?
Title: The Big Dry
Author: Tony Davis
Publisher: HarperCollins, $15.99 RRP
Publication Date: 1 July 2013
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 9780732297633
For ages: 12+
Type: Young Adult